From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   How we must Follow Christ's Way of the Cross in Self-Denial  [IV]   
      
   CHRIST.   
   My son, since you know and have studied these things, blessed are you   
   if you do them. (John 13:17) Whoever truly loves Me knows and obeys My   
   commands. I will love him, and will reveal Myself to him, (John 14:21)   
   and he shall reign with Me in the Kingdom of My Father. (Rev.3:21)   
   --Thomas à Kempis --Imitation of Christ Book 3  Ch 56   
      
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   December 30th – Bl. Margaret Colonna, Virgin   
   Also known as Margaret of Cortona, Margarita, Margherita, Marguerite   
   d. 1280   
      
   MARGARET was daughter of Prince Odo Colonna, but losing both her   
   parents when a child she was brought up under the care of her two   
   brothers. She refused the marriage arranged for her, and lived a   
   retired life with two attendants in a villa at Palestrina, devoting   
   her time and her goods to the relief of the sick and poor. It was her   
   intention to join the Poor Clares in their house at Assisi, but   
   sickness prevented this, and she conceived the idea of establishing a   
   convent at Palestrina.   
      
   Her younger brother, James, who had been created cardinal (and so is   
   distinguished as dignior frater from her senior frater, John, who   
   wrote her life), obtained the pope’s permission and the community was   
   given the rule of the Poor Clare nuns as modified by Urban IV. But it   
   would seem that, on account of ill-health, Bl. Margaret herself   
   neither governed nor was professed in this convent; for the last seven   
   years of her life she suffered from a malignant growth, bearing   
   continual pain with the greatest courage and patience. She had the   
   gift of miracles, and other unusual graces are recorded of her. After   
   her death at an early age the nuns of Palestrina removed into the City   
   to San Silvestro in Capite, taking the body of their foundress with   
   them. When this monastery was turned into a general post office 700   
   years later the relics were translated to the nuns’ new home at St   
   Cecilia in Trastevere. Pope Pius IX confirmed the cultus of Bl.   
   Margaret Colonna in 1847.   
      
   The Franciscan Chroniclers, such as Wadding and Mark of Lisbon, have   
   published full accounts of Bl. Margaret; the story is told in detail   
   in, e.g. Mazzara, Leggendario Francescano (1680), vol. ii Pt. 2, pp.   
   775-780. In B. Margherita Colonna (1935) Fr L. Oliger edited and   
   introduced an unpublished MS. of the 14th century, which combines   
   parts of vitae by John Colonna (d. c. 1292) and by a Poor Clare of San   
   Silvestro (1290). For English readers there is an account available in   
   Léon, Auréole Séraphique Eng. trans.), vol. iv, pp. 170-173.   
      
      
   Bible Quote:   
   And because you are sons, God hath sent the Spirit of his Son into   
   your hearts, crying: Abba, Father.Therefore now he is not a servant,   
   but a son. And if a son, an heir also through God.  (Galatians 4:6-7)   
      
   Saint Quote:   
   As the Lord knows for what we all are adapted, He gives to all their   
   positions as He sees to be most for His glory, for their salvation,   
   and the good of their neighbors.  Our mistake, then, is in not   
   submitting ourselves totally to whatever He wishes to do with us.   
   --St. Teresa   
      
      
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   O Jesus, Dear Holy Child   
   By St Thérèse of the Child Jesus (1873 – 1897)   
      
   O Jesus,   
   dear Holy Child,   
   my only treasure,   
   I abandon myself to Thy every whim.   
   I seek no other joy   
   than that of calling forth Thy sweet Smile.   
   Vouchsafe to me, the graces and the virtues   
   of Thy Holy Childhood,   
   so that, on the day of my birth into Heaven,   
   the Angels and Saints   
   may recognise in Thy Spouse,   
   Thérèse of the Child Jesus.   
   Amen   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)